This is his Dad’s account of the last 6 weeks:
As I read what I wrote on 11/13, it leaves me with a sick feeling. So much has happened since then, I am going to have to be brief. Soon after the 11/13 update, Jesse was deemed pneumonia-free and moved out of the ICU for a few days of observation before being sent to RIC. He was then admitted to RIC, where he immediately began telling is that his health was getting worse. The doctors explained that with all the movement from one facility to the other, plus all the stresses put on his body, plus just getting over pneumonia, it was to be expected and they would watch him. He continued trying his best at rehab while telling us he was feeling sicker for three days and then suddenly on day 4 he was being sent to Northwestern’s Emergency Room with a 105.3 fever – two hours later he was transferred to a room where he went code blue. The next night he went code blue again! Diagnosis – a second case of pneumonia, this time staph based and was hiding behind his heart for several days while it went untreated. Two weeks later – he had now lost an additional 10% of his body weight, bringing the total to 30%!
During the three weeks at Northwestern, Jesse was told that his vocal cords were paralyzed and now they were not sure when he would speak again. He was also told they wanted to do a swallow study – although the speech therapist at RIC wanted him to prepare for a couple weeks before he took it. Since he was not at RIC, they insisted and the result was a failed swallow test and a kid who just wanted to die after learning the three things he should have had from the start (breathing, talking and eating/drinking) were now weeks or months away at best. Three brutal weeks of disappointments and lying in bed getting weaker.
On the day before thanksgiving he was transferred from Northwestern’s ICU directly to RIC. On Thanksgiving day he was diagnosed with pneumonia #3. This time we begged them to treat him there versus sending him back to the hospital where he keeps getting sick. They agreed and started his antibiotic treatment at RIC. Happy Thanksgiving. By December 18th, he was being taken off antibiotics again and deemed infection-free. However, depression was another story. After all these setbacks and delays, the toughest guy in the world is losing his fight. We are still to this day working to rebuild the fight in him.
On December 23rd, he had his first bout of Autonomic Dysreflexia – thankfully we caught it early and he did not have any permanent damage. The next day we found the root cause, a urinary tract infection that was causing him to have a fever and a heart rate that ran above 130 for almost 24 hours. His Christmas was no better than his Thanksgiving – sick with an infection and in pain. He was up for the rehab, but never anticipated that out of the first 70 days post-injury, he would only have maybe 9 days of rehab – and none in rehab with good health to support him! Every day we pray that he gets healthier and something good happens for him.
On December 26th the doctors were still confused by Jesse’s health and sent him for a CT scan where they found something growing in his larynx area. He was moved to Northwestern for the test, moved back to RIC, then an hour later brought back to Northwestern where they left him in the ER room for over 6 hours! We are still waiting to hear their full diagnosis and treatment recommendations. One more setback that he’ll have to fight through! One more reason to send him a message of encouragement.